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THE BOXING PRESS conference is now the realm of a peculiar creature. Ascended from venturing upstart to king of the jungle, the YouTuber reigns supreme. Content critters.
The consequence of this is that at an event like Thursday’s prefight media hosting unfolds in a particular pattern. Katie Taylor, Karen Elizabeth Carabajal and the rest of the undercard sit at the top table alongside promoter Eddie Hearn who masterfully steers the entire operation.
From the guts of an hour it moves from fighter to fighter, as they dutifully express gratitude for their opportunity and talk up their ambitions. No questions come from the floor. At the end, Hearn draws proceedings to a close and the tripod wielding masses descend, dragging various obliging fighters back to their lair. Which suits Taylor perfectly, as she can carry out her responsibilities and swiftly exit stage right, away from an environment where she never seems fully at ease.
Her domain is between the ropes. At this stage it is obvious she is truly at home in the ring. What can be imperceptible is how endlessly expressive Katie Taylor is there. Articulate in a profoundly powerful way.
It is with her punches that the Bray boxer demonstrates remarkable intelligence, an enormous thoughtfulness, the endless devotion to her craft.
Consider her 2017 bout against Anahi Sanchez at Cardiff’s Principality Stadium. More specifically, consider the huge left-hand body shot that dropped the Argentinian in the second round.
Trainer Ross Enamait, a boxing historian in his own right, took delight from that one punch. A reminder of a famous day in his hometown of Connecticut. That shot was precisely like the famous left-hand Micky Ward unleashed to drop Arthur Gatti in 2002. On both occasions, the opponent showed enormous guts to rise from the canvas and muster on.
In 2019, it was the right that reached into the storied sports archive when Taylor became a two-weight world champion by defeating Christina Linardatou. More than once, she stung the teak-tough Dominican-born Greek with a huge backhand loop to the ribcage.
Between rounds, Enamait’s instruction was just discernible. “Like Roy Jones,” he bellowed. In the build-up, they watched footage of a Jones Jr’s 1998 bill against Virgil Hill, a fine fighter who was 43-2 at the time.
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Originally published at 13.09; Updated at 15.03
